Can’t not mention the Studillac when honoring the ’53 Starliner. Bill Frick, who had already built up a bit of a business stuffing Caddy V8s into Ford sedans (“Fordillacs”), instantly saw potential as soon as the first ’53 Studebaker coupes hit the road. The 259 cubic inch Studebaker V8 was hardly a hot number, with all of 120 (gross) hp. Transplanting a new Cadillac engine turned it into one the world’s most potent road cars in the world, with a 0 – 60 of 8.5 seconds and 125 mph top speed.

McCahill’s review is interesting also as a period piece, with his pithy comments on styling, handling and other qualities of the Studebaker as well as other cars of the time. Uncle Tom is always worth reading: modernmechanix.com

Loved Uncle Tom. His metaphors in automotive journalism certainly inspired Brock Yates (to a leser degree). You Tube has the ’58 car comparison desert showdown (Tom was shilling for Mopar). Flick does highlight how sloppy the GM products of ’58 were against the Mopars. Of course, Mopar was on an uphill struggle that year with the one-two punch of piss-poor ’57 quality issues and the Eisenhower recession.

I love those videos. The last one with the Cadillac’s doors and trunk flopping open is impressive. I drove a 59 Plymouth for awhile, and have no doubt that those 1958 Mopars could spank anything else when it came to pure driving.

I remembered the cars’ mishaps in the tests, but I’d forgotten how much fun it is listening to McCahill. “Corners as flat as a bookkeeper’s chest”, “This road has more bumps and grinds built into it than a honkey-tonk chorus gal”.

This article is a knockout in so many ways. Performance benchmarks were Ferrari and Bentley! 0-60 under 10 seconds was impressive. And it may be the origin of the coke bottle hung in the fender story. What a character. What a different and distant time.

The only true stuff I knew about (auto assembly from those days – I had cousins that worked in the industry in Kansas City and St. Louis) was an occasional candy wrapper or a section of newspaper left in a door panel/seat frame. A cousin who worked assembling Mopars in Belvidere, Ill (St. Louis) did talk about “thermoses full of libations” and using rubber mallets inside of fenders to get them to “fit” and line up. No news, really. Could’ve been Uncle Tom spreading an urban legend.

Billy, Belvidere is actually near Rockford, IL. I drove past the factory once on the way to a car show in St. Charles, it’s right next to the Interstate. I’m pretty sure my sister’s ’08 Jeep Patriot was built there. The ’92 Caravan ES my mom had was built in St. Louis, though.

I was surprised to read about the poor quality control. I had a ’51 Champion, and it seemed fairly well put together. Was Studebaker having labor issues in ’53? McCahill’s comments about the UAW line-workers seemed like they were written only yesterday!